


Normality is Relative

by GemmaRose



Series: The New Normal [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: (due to aformentioned body mods), Body Dysphoria, Body Image, Breasts, Fingerfucking, Gen, Heart-to-Heart, Masturbation, Nipple Play, Non-Consensual Body Modification, Panic Attacks, Self-Acceptance, Vaginal Fingering
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-22
Updated: 2017-08-23
Packaged: 2018-12-18 18:05:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 2
Words: 3,905
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11879925
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/GemmaRose/pseuds/GemmaRose
Summary: Lance may not remember the whole movement he spent in druid hands, but it's impossible to put what they did to him out of mind. In the end, it's just another thing space has thrown at him that he'll have to get used to.





	1. Chapter 1

He staggered out of the cryo-pod groggy, disoriented, and off-balance. Warm arms caught him before he could overbalance and fall on the hard floor, and he slumped against the solid frame as his brain finished booting up. Hunk was hugging him, he realized belatedly. Hugging him and firing questions at him faster than he could process at the moment. Cryo-pods always messed with his head, and he made an affirmative sound as he leaned closer to his friend and shut his eyes.

He was coming out of cryo, which meant he’d been hurt. Nobody else was here, which meant it was late. Or early. Sometime in the night cycle. He frowned, and pulled away from Hunk as he opened his eyes, taking a moment to get his words in order before speaking. “What happened?”

“You mean you don’t remember?” Hunk’s hands slid to rest on one of his shoulders and the opposite bicep.

“Nope.” Lance shook his head.

“You were captured. The druids-”

The druids. Lance staggered back a step, away from Hunk. The interrogations, the whispers, the _table_. He took another shaky step back and collapsed, legs giving out as he looked down at himself. Hunk caught him before he hit the floor, and Lance closed his eyes but now that he was aware of it he couldn’t not notice. This was wrong, the pods were supposed to _fix_ them, not-

“Breathe.”

That single word leapt out at him through Hunk’s unintelligible haze of babble, and Lance drew a shaking breath without question. It came out again quickly, and strong fingers wrapped around his wrist to press his hand to a firm chest. It rose slowly against his palm, and he tried to match its speed but didn’t even get halfway before all the air in his lungs came rushing out again in something far too close to a sob.

“It’s okay.” Shiro said, flattening Lance’s hand against his chest over his heart. “Let’s try again.” he inhaled, and Lance pulled his hand away.

“I- I-” he choked on air, words deserting him, and Hunk’s hands were on him again in seconds.

“It’s okay.” he said softly, pulling Lance into a hug. “You’re safe. We got you out of there before they could finish the surgery. Everything’s okay.”

“No!” Lance pulled back, shoulders tense, chest and lungs burning, head swimming slightly from lack of proper oxygen. He was going to pass out, he could tell. And then they’d stick him back in a pod and he’d come out normal.

“I’ll keep the others out.” Shiro said, standing and looking at Hunk. “Calm him down.”

“Will do.” Hunk nodded, then stood and held out a hand to Lance as Shiro left. “Sorry.” Hunk smiled, shaky and uneven. “Can I touch you?”

Lance nodded, and belatedly realized his whole body was shaking. Hunk approached slowly, cautiously, and Lance would’ve been offended at being treated like a skittish wild animal if he didn’t feel like a loud noise would make him jump about ten feet in the air and bolt to the other side of the room. Hunk’s hands wrapped around both of his, and Hunk lifted one to press over his own heart while touching the other to Lance’s sternum. “Breathe with me.” he said, and Lance did his best.

He wasn’t sure how long it took, for his body to stop trembling and his breaths to match Hunk’s on every measure inhale and exhale, but he knew that his throat hurt and chest hurt and his body still felt weird in a way that had nothing to do with oxygen deprivation.

“Better?” Hunk asked softly, and Lance nodded.

“Yeah. Thanks.” he grinned, and it felt weak and insincere but he didn’t have the energy to care.

“Think you’re up to seeing the rest of the team?” Hunk withdrew the hand pressed to Lance’s chest as he stood, pulling Lance to his feet by the hand he still held.

“Yeah.” Lance nodded, reflexively lifting a hand to rake his fingers through his hair. “Yeah, just. Gimme a sec.” he shut his eyes and exhaled until there was no air left in his lungs, then inhaled slowly and deliberately. If the pod hadn’t fixed him the first time, it wouldn’t fix him the second. Which meant he was stuck like this now. He looked down at himself, and swallowed the creeping sense of wrongness as he examined how the cryo-med suit clung to the contours of his body. “Actually.” he looked up at Hunk and crossed his arms over his stomach, shoulders hunching forwards just a little. “Can I get dressed first?”

“Of course.” Hunk grinned, and Lance followed him to the hallway. Maybe it wouldn’t be noticeable, once he was wearing his usual clothes.

\---

After that first day, thing went more or less back to normal. The rest of the team seemed happy to have him back, regardless of what changes the druids had made. Really, the only change was that Pidge had taken to joking that a body swap between them would be the best thing ever, which Lance always refuted with a jibe about their height. But despite the acceptance from the rest of the team, Lance just couldn’t get used to the differences. His showers were short, perfunctory, and shaving was abandoned entirely.

Worst of all, however incomplete the druids’ surgery had been, they’d evidently given him something to keep his body producing the ‘right’ hormones. Only now, instead of waking up from dirty dreams with a boner, he woke up with a pulsing, foreign _need_ between his legs. Lance pressed his legs together and rolled over onto his front, burying his face in his pillow. He hated this. Hated hiding in clothes that no longer quite fit, hated avoiding his reflection below the shoulders, hated how unfamiliar he’d become with his own body. The galra hadn’t even had him for a movement, had only tried to pry answers out of him twice, and even over a phoeb later he couldn’t get over what had happened.

Shiro had changed so much more, had lost an arm and gained scars and been separated from his crew. He’d been with the galra for an entire _year_ , and aside from some totally understandable gladiator-related PTSD he was perfectly fine. Lance grabbed at his hair and bit the pillow under his face to muffle a scream. Why was he so _weak_? Why did every step, every brush of his shirt against his chest, make him want to hunt down the druids who changed him and hold them at gunpoint until they reversed it?

A knock came on the door, and Lance sat up quickly. “Yeah?” he asked, curling his knees up towards his chest and drawing his blanket around his shoulders.

“It’s Shiro. Can I come in?”

“Sure.” Lance relaxed slightly, scooting up against the wall next to his bed as the door opened and Shiro walked in.

“I...” Shiro hesitated, frowned, then shook his head and exhaled hard through his nose. “Can I sit down?”

“Sure.” Lance shifted towards the foot of the bed a bit, and Shiro came and sat almost on his pillow.

“How are you doing?” Shiro asked after a few seconds of silence, looking at his hands instead of at Lance.

“I’m fine.” Lance grinned, quick and easy and well-practiced as of late. “C’mon, Shiro, we mind meld every day. You’d know if I wasn’t.”

“You can be honest with me, Lance.” Shiro said, his voice soft. Panic speared through Lance’s gut, and Shiro’s flesh and blood hand came to rest on his right foot. “It’s alright, I doubt the others can tell.”

“Then how can you?” Lance asked, and promptly winced. Stupid, stupid, that was as good as a confession.

Shiro removed his hand from Lance’s foot, and rubbed at where his prosthetic ended. “Keep a secret long enough, you learn to recognize how other people hide the same thing.”

A secret? Lance frowned at Shiro, then his jaw fell slack as his eyes widened. “Your arm.”

Shiro nodded, and lifted his head to look at Lance. “And that’s the only thing they gave me. I got off easy, compared to you.” his face softened, and Lance leaned forward as he lowered his knees to rest on the bed pointing towards Shiro. “So, how are you doing?”

Lance looked away, ducking his head to examine the blanket wrapped around him. Shiro... Shiro got it. Shiro would understand. “I want my old body back.” he said softly. “I didn’t want this, I didn’t _ask_ for this. They just, cut me open and went to work.” a harsh, borderline hysterical laugh slipped out of his mouth, and he inhaled deeply through his nose before letting it all out in a single puff of breath. “And now I just-”

“You can’t look in the mirror without seeing what they did to you.” Shiro matched Lance in volume, and he nodded with a shaky exhale. “Do you want to know what I did?” Lance lifted his head and looked at Shiro, who offered him a small smile. “I found the good things about it.” he looked down at his arm, flexing the metal fingers. “I may not have asked to get a galra weapon grafted onto my body, but because of this I can activate galra technology. I didn’t want to be a gladiator in their arenas, but because of it I’m strong enough, skilled enough, to use this arm they gave me against them.”

“Huh.” Lance looked away from Shiro, at the door to his room. “Well, I guess one upside is I don’t have to worry about awkward boners anymore.”

Shiro snorted, and Lance whipped his head around to stare. “Sorry.” Shiro grinned, smile half hidden behind his loosely curled prosthetic hand. Lance grinned back, and leaned back against the wall again.

“It’s okay.” he said, and found that he meant it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I did not intend for there to be this much non-porn at the start? But Lance kinda, took the story and ran with it. Tomorrow's chapter will be smut tho!


	2. Chapter 2

Lance settled back against the headboard wall of his bed, and exhaled slowly. If he was going to find the good things about his new body, make it his own instead of something forced on him by the druids, he would need to re-learn himself first. So once they were done with training for the day, he’d retreated to his room and locked the door. But now that he was alone, and reasonably sure nobody would bother him for a few hours, he had no idea where to start.

He moved to shimmy out of his pants, then paused. No, that- he wasn’t ready for that yet. Instead, he sat up and pulled his shirt off over his head. The wall was cool against his shoulders when he leaned back, and he shivered slightly as he shut his eyes. Lifting one hand, he let it fall until it rested lightly on his lower ribs. He could feel muscle under his fingertips, well defined by the grueling training Allura and Coran put them through on a daily basis.

Letting his hand drift lower, he inhaled deliberately to dispel some of the tension building in his core. He’d never had super visible muscles, but he was proud of his swimmer’s physique, all lean and trim with no excess muscle or fat. Now, though, his stomach was softer. Like Pidge and Keith’s had been, back when they were still new to this whole Paladin thing. He traced idle shapes over the soft spot for a minute or so, imagining he could feel the alien organ under his skin before stilling and curling his fingers hard enough that his nails bit into his skin. He could just imagine ripping it out, sinking his fingers into his own body deep enough he could grab the alien organ inside him and pull it free. Would it be red, or would it be the colour of whatever alien the galra had taken it from?

Would it be purple?

His stomach turned, and he lifted his hand. That wasn’t going to help. He needed to think of good things. Body fat helped with buoyancy in the water, the bit of squish over his new organ would help with that. And it wasn’t like he’d lost any muscle mass, so it was just- like Hunk. He was still strong, it just wasn’t as immediately visible. Lowering his hand to his stomach again, he traced the waistband of his pants a little before trailing his fingers back up to his lower ribs. Was he brave enough to venture higher, yet? Just the thought filled his gut with a heavy feeling, which dissipated when he let his hand drift back down.

He’d do that later, someday. He pressed his whole palm to his skin this time, and took a second to marvel at the smoothness. The healing pods almost never left scars, but he could vaguely recall being splayed open on a table with large pieces of his skin and muscle pinned open to reveal his internal organs. It was almost as strange as knowing that he couldn’t go back to being a cis guy, feeling perfectly smooth skin where his brain insisted there should be huge ugly scars. Well, not perfectly smooth, he did have a few scars from battles and infiltration missions gone particularly bad, but the majority of his skin was soft to the touch.

Soft, and kinda nice. It reminded him of the boy he’d secret-sorta-dated at the Garrison for a month or two, of stolen kisses when they snuck into the simulator after hours for private tutoring sessions and study sessions which ended with ever bolder touches on both their parts. Lance pulled his hand away hastily, cheeks flushing as he slid down and buried his face in a pillow and resolutely ignored the heat between his legs. That was enough self-exploration for tonight.

\---

Lance turned onto his side with a groan, refusing to open his eyes. It was nowhere near late enough for him to need to be up, he could tell because his entire body was screaming at him to go back to sleep. But if it was so early, why was he awake? A shiver ran through him, and Lance groaned again. Right, the castle’s climate control was on the fritz, and this was his thickest blanket. He rolled onto his back again, and opened his eyes with a grimace. The fabric of his altean PJs was super soft, like fleece and silk had a baby, but right now his nipples were so firm from cold that even his sleep shirt felt like sandpaper on them.

He could theoretically just take the shirt off and keep the blanket down far enough not to touch them, but it was cold as hell in here, so fuck that. He tried to find a comfortable position that didn’t make his chest feel like it was capped with two tiny pieces of fire, and a frustrated whine escaped his throat when nothing worked. Sliding a hand up under his shirt, he didn’t even think before grabbing one of his tiny breasts and cupping his palm over the nipple there. The hint of warmth his frozen hand provided was a relief, and he used his free hand to pull the blanket up to completely cover his body.

Turning onto his side, he curled his legs up slightly and released his breast with a hiss. Thankfully it didn’t take long to pull his arms into his shirt, and he sighed as he cupped both nipples under his chilly palms. Another shiver racked his body, and he moved to warm himself before realizing that would probably make his nipples hurt again. Maybe if he warmed them up a bit they wouldn’t be so sensitive? He wiggled his shirt up until he could duck his head down into the fabric and breathe on his palms to warm them up.

His hands, once warm, felt heavenly on his cold tits. He pressed his palms flat to the soft flesh with a quiet hum, and once the warmth had leached into his chest he slid his hands down slightly. His fingers were slightly chilly against his newly warmed skin, but it was a nice kind of chill. The kind that drew a little gasp from his mouth as he rubbed gentle circles around his nipples, trying to warm himself even slightly with the friction. He soon switched to using his thumbs, running the pads over his nipples directly. It felt good, really good, the type of good that made his breath hitch and a whimper build in his throat that wanted to turn into a full moan.

The air under his blanket was growing warmer and stuffier by the second, and he rolled his nipples between his fingers. He turned, pressing both shoulders back into the mattress, and squeezed his thighs together as he lifted his hips off the sheets. He wasn’t cold anymore, but it felt good, and the last time he’d felt this good had been, well, before. He tugged at his nipples gently, and let a soft whimper past his lips. His thighs rubbed together, and with a jolt he realized he was wet. Not from pre-come dripping down his cock or onto his stomach, but from- from whatever the druids had given him.

His stomach churned anxiously, and he took a breath which was shakier than the last for a very different reason. He slid his right hand down off his boob, down over his soft stomach, down across his pelvis. He stopped when his fingers met thick damp curls, and took another shivering breath. He could do this. He’d gotten used to having an alien organ in him, to having breasts, he could get used to having something other than a dick between his legs.

He carded his fingers through his pubes, and something cold and shivery twisted around the heat in his gut as they touched damp, hairless skin. The sensation was strange, and he swallowed his apprehension as he pressed harder. His fingers slid down further, between slick folds of flesh, and he sucked a breath in through his teeth as he realized they were inside him. He squeezed his eyes shut tight, and pressed his fingers in deeper before curling and trying to spread them.

The feeling, which had been weird from the start, intensified as he stretched himself. His crotch pulsed with warmth, but the pleasant feeling in his core had all but vanished. He tried spreading his fingers a few more times, but each one only felt worse. He pulled his hand back hastily, and wiped it on the sheets. The mood was gone. He slid his arms back into his sleeves, pulled the blanket tighter around himself, and settled in to wait until his room warmed up enough to get back to sleep.

\---

Lance squirmed against his mattress, removing one hand from his nipples and tracing it down over his stomach. A thin trail of fine hairs lead down from his belly button, and he carded his fingers through the damp curls between his legs without hesitation. He found the smooth, wet skin nestled in the middle, and traced the edge with a shiver. He could do this, it was his body now. There was nothing to be afraid of.

He took a shaky breath, and pushed a finger into himself. It felt, well, mostly weird but not in a bad way like the last time he’d tried. He curled his finger experimentally, and oooh that felt good. He did it a few more times, harder with each press, until he hit a spot that sent electric pleasure coursing through his body. He gasped, and slid a second finger in next to the first to press on that spot again. Fuck, it felt _good_ ; better than anything he’d been able to do to himself when he had a dick.

He added a third finger and moved his wrist more vigorously, rocking his hips up into every press. A moan slid past his lips as heat coiled low in his gut, growing tighter with every burst of pleasure. He was close, so close, but it wasn’t enough. Fluid dripped in a steady steam from his hole, trickling down his ass and wetting the sheets under his hips, and he didn’t even care. He was so aroused it nearly hurt, but no matter how hard he slammed his fingers into himself he couldn’t reach the peak.

Lance whined and added his pinky finger, splaying them as far as he could. The slight stretch was almost as good as that spot inside him had been, and he wondered what it would feel like to have something bigger than his fingers inside him. To be stretched out, filled up... more fluid squelched out around his fingers, and he moaned wantonly. Being held down and fucked senseless wasn’t exactly a new fantasy, but now his body seemed even more receptive to the idea. Spreading himself and fantasizing wasn’t getting him any closer to coming, though, so he withdrew his dripping fingers with a groan.

Fuck, how did girls get off? He’d only had the one relationship that got past second base, and that was with a guy, so this was just as alien to him as, well, the fact that he was trying to masturbate with a literally alien vagina. He really hoped it didn’t involve full penetration, because Allura had made her lack of interest in him perfectly clear and he was definitely not asking any of his teammates for help.

Lance flopped back on his bed, and pouted up at the ceiling. Okay, he had to think logically. If that spot he could reach wasn’t enough, there had to be another spot that was. That would be either beyond the reach of his fingers, or somewhere external. He slid his wet fingers over the smooth dip of flesh between his thighs, circling his entrance, and his breath hitched as his index finger passed over a small bud of flesh. He paused, and traced a circle around it, shivering at the sensation.

A few circling passes of his fingers brought the nub up almost to the size of one of his nipples, and he experimentally rolled it between his fingers. The sensation was electric, almost overwhelming, and his fingers slid down to pump into him as his thighs tensed, the spring-wound heat in his core releasing in a flood of ecstasy. He pounded his fingers into himself as hard as he could, and brought his free hand down to tease the nub above his entrance further as his come spilled across his thighs and ass.

He was just starting to come down when a fresh wave of bliss crashed over him, drawing out a loud moan from his lips as he came again. Hot, overwhelming raw sensation pulsed in his crotch with every beat of his racing heart, and when Lance came down he withdrew his soaking wet hand from between his legs. Fuck, that was awesome. Why had he taken so long to warm up to this? His team didn’t care, he still looked awesome, and now he got all wet and could apparently come multiple times in a row? Sure, he’d have to change the sheets before going to sleep tonight, but that was a small price to pay for an orgasm that good from his hands alone.

He could definitely get used to this.


End file.
